Part 12 (2/2)

We have amongst us three kinds of brothers: Novices or Apprentices, Fellows or Professed Brothers, Masters or Perfected Brethren. To the first are explained the moral virtues; to the second the heroic virtues; to the last the Christian virtues....

It might be said then that the Rose-Croix degree was here foreshadowed in the Masters' degree, in that the latter definitely inculcated Christianity. This would be perfectly in accord with Ramsay's point of view as set forth in his account of his conversion by Fenelon. When he first met the Archbishop of Cambrai in 1710, Ramsay relates that he had lost faith in all Christian sects and had resolved to ”take refuge in a wise Deism limited to respect for the Divinity and for the immutable ideas of pure virtue,” but that his conversation with Fenelon led him to accept the Catholic faith. And he goes on to show that ”Monsieur de Cambrai turned Atheists into Deists, Deists into Christians, and Christians into Catholics by a sequence of ideas full of enlightenment and feeling.”[381]

Might not this be the process which Ramsay aimed at introducing into Freemasonry--the process which in fact does form part of the masonic system in England to-day, where the Atheist must become, at least by profession, a Deist before he can be admitted to the Craft Degrees, whilst the Rose-Croix degree is reserved solely for those who profess the Christian faith? Such was undoubtedly the idea of the men who introduced the Rose-Croix degree into France; and Ragon, who gives an account of this ”Ancien Rose-Croix Francais”--which is almost identical with the degree now worked in England, but long since abandoned in France--objects to it on the very score of its Christian character.[382]

In this respect the Rose-Croix amongst all the upper degrees introduced to France in the middle of the eighteenth century stands alone, and it alone can with any probability be attributed to Scottish Jacobite inspiration. It was not, in fact, until three or four years after Lord Derwent.w.a.ter or his mysterious successor Lord Harnouester[383] had resigned the Grand Masters.h.i.+p in favour of the Duc d'Antin in 1738 that the additional degrees were first heard of, and it was not until eight years after the Stuart cause had received its death-blow at Culloden, that is to say, in 1754, that the Rite of Perfection in which the so-called Scots Degrees were incorporated was drawn up in the following form:

Rite of Perfection

1. Entered Apprentice.

2. Fellow Craft.

3. Master Mason.

4. Secret Master.

5. Perfect Master.

6. Intimate Secretary.

7. Intendant of the Buildings.

8. Provost and Judge.

9. Elect of Nine.

10. Elect of Fifteen.

11. Chief of the Twelve Tribes.

12. Grand Master Architect.

13. Knight of the Ninth Arch.

14. Ancient Grand Elect.

15. Knight of the Sword.

16. Prince of Jerusalem.

17. Knight of the East and West.

18. Rose-Croix Knight.

19. Grand Pontiff.

20. Grand Patriarch.

21. Grand Master of the Key of Masonry.

22. Prince of Liba.n.u.s or Knight of the Royal Axe.

23. Sovereign Prince Adept.

24. Commander of the Black and White Eagle.

25. Commander of the Royal Secret.[384]

We have only to glance at the nomenclature of the last twenty-two of these degrees to see that on the basis of mere operative Masonry there has been built up a system composed of two elements: crusading chivalry and Judaic tradition. What else is this but Templarism? Even Mr. Gould, usually so reticent on Templar influence, admits it at this period:

In France ... some of the Scots lodges would appear to have very early manufactured new degrees, connecting these very distinguished Scots Masons with the Knights Templar, and thus given rise to the subsequent flood of Templarism. The earliest of all are supposed to have been the Masons of Lyons who invented the Kadosch degree, representing the vengeance of the Templars, in 1741. From that time new rites multiplied in France and Germany, but all those of French origin contain Knightly, and almost all, Templar grades. In every case the connecting link was composed of one or more Scots degrees.[385]

The name Kadosch here mentioned is a Hebrew word signifying ”holy” or ”consecrated,” which in the Cabala is found in conjunction with the Tetragrammaton.[386] The degree is said to have developed from that of Grand Elect,[387] one of the three ”degrees of vengeance” celebrating with sanguinary realism the avenging of the murder of Hiram. But in its final form of Knight Kadosch--later to become the thirtieth degree of the ”Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite”--the Hiramic legend was changed into the history of the Templars with Jacques du Molay as the victim.[388] So the reprobation of attack on authority personified by the master-builder becomes approbation of attack on authority in the person of the King of France.

The introduction of the upper degrees with their political and, later on, anti-Christian tendencies thus marked a complete departure from the fundamental principle of Freemasonry that ”nothing concerning the religion or government shall ever be spoken of in the lodge.” For this reason they have been a.s.sailed not only by anti-masonic writers but by Freemasons themselves.[389] To represent Barruel and Robison as the enemies of Freemasonry is therefore absolutely false; neither of these men denounced Craft Masonry as practised in England, but only the superstructure erected on the Continent. Barruel indeed incurs the reproaches of Mounier for his champions.h.i.+p of English Freemasons:

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